Not From Me
by Rebekah D
Summary: A continuation piece between Branson and Sybil after he's driven her to her course in York.
1. Chapter 1

**Not From Me**

Author's Note: This is missing scene fiction for the first part, the next installments I hope will be entirely original from the second series which is currently airing in the UK.

Disclaimer: I do not own Downton Abbey I use these characters without permission, but make no money for my efforts.

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><p>"They won't hear, not from me."<p>

The words seem to hang in the air between them. He stares at her intently, his eyes that conveyed so much passion and conviction moments before now looking sad and defeated. If you look even closer the passionate gleam in them has been replaced by the barest sheen of un-shed tears. The words though, they seemed to have both saddened him more than the original rejection and bolstered him simultaneously.

He won't be sacked, but could he really hold out the two months of her course and then live with seeing her again everyday, reliving her rejection every time he drives her into Ripon or into the village? He's a wilful man, he knows that, but is he a masochist? No, no he's not.

"I'll carry your bags to your rooms, milady." He bends forward and picks her luggage back up and walks into the next courtyard only a few meters ahead of them.

"Branson, Tom... it's not necessary." Sybil's voice carries over the cold stones surrounding them, as she follows him into the empty courtyard the clicks of her heels on the stones of the corridor still echo as she steps down. She's never called him by his given first name before, but the rules of propriety have been shattered with his declaration and proposal, she may as well tear down the barrier even further.

He stops his movements, putting the bags down and letting go of the handles whilst looking up at her, his sad eyes taking in her equally sad expression.

"I will miss you," she says. She has the inexplicable urge to reach out and cup his cheek in her hand, but all she can muster is to tightly wring her hands together, the fine leather gloves she wears rub against each other smoothly.

"You don't have to say that... Sybil?" He says her name as a question; because it is, he's asking if it's truly all right to call her that, she's been Sybil in his head for so long. He literally cannot count how many times he's had to remind himself not to call her that and force out the proper _milady_, when addressing her. For him she always felt like someone who wasn't above him or below him, she was always just Sybil - the woman he fell in love with. And now the woman who has rejected him.

"But it's true, Tom. I will miss you... everyday," She's looking him right in the eyes, trying to communicate without the words what she feels for him truly, but she just can't say them, not yet. As much as she likes to parade about with her forthright and precocious modern ways, feeling the way she does about him - those feelings frighten her almost as much as the war its self.

He seems to be weighing his options as he looks her over, it feels like it could be the last time he ever does this.

"Whatever happens, promise me when I've finished here that Edith won't be the one driving the Renault alone to take me home. That it'll be you." She boldly, or desperately takes a step forward, invading his personal space, trying again without words to tell him her feelings.

He takes off his hat again and tells her, "I'll do my best," his mouth hangs open after the last word, like he's gathering the courage to utter her name for the last time, the second time ever actually, "Sybil." There he's said it.

She smiles up at him, they're close enough now that she can just barely feel his breath on her face, and his body heat. She takes in a deep breath, trying to capture the scent of him in her lungs, he has such a unique scent. She remembers the first time he ever drove her anywhere, she was with one of her sisters she remembers, Taylor was such an old codger, she never really paid all that much attention to him, he simply did his job. Branson though, that first car trip with him at the wheel, she sat in the back-seat and smiled out the window relishing in the fact that Taylor had been replaced by a very handsome young man. That trip though, she sat looking out the window and breathed in deep and caught the scent of something she had never smelled before. It was a pleasant smell, but it wasn't coming from her or her sister or from outside. She breathed in again and followed her nose taking in that the heady, musky scent was coming from Branson. It was then that all those bits in novels she'd read in the past, about the masculine scent of a man, and the effects they could have on someone of the opposite sex was finally understood. She blushed into her gloved hand, and realised that she was fiercely attracted to the chauffeur. A couple of days later her attraction grew, for he turned around and addressed her while they were alone in the cab, he talked with her and handed her those first pamphlets. Tom Branson single-handedly changed her life - for the better she now knows.

"I should say good-bye now... Sybil." His mouth seemed to savour her name.

"Yes..." She takes a step forward again. She's so close now that she can tell that he'd shaved very closely this morning indeed, and that one of his eyes is a slightly lighter shade of blue than the other.

Like that summer afternoon so long ago, he takes up her hand - only no one who knows them is around to scold them with their gaze, and later with their words.

"I don't suppose..." She says mirroring the words he said that afternoon, but then was interrupted by Mrs. Hughes. He stops her, cupping her cheek in his gloved hand.

"I don't suppose anything... I only hope." He says, his thumb gently grazing her cheek.

They move closer, and she can't stop staring at his mouth. His eyes dart back and forth between her eyes and her mouth as well. She knows it's going to happen, she wants it to, she knows he does as well.

His breath is warm on her face, and his hand is still cupping her cheek. He leans down, and just as she feels the barest touch of his lips on hers a door slams to their right and a man in a green army uniform comes walking toward them. His eyes rake over them still standing too close, but not touching as Branson has dropped his hand. She breathes in rapidly, as does he. The man in the uniform passes them without a word and goes through the corridor they just walked through.

"That may have been for the best." He says finally, taking a step back and putting his hat back on.

"I'll never think that." She counters quietly just as woman in an impossibly neat nurses uniform steps out of the same door as the man in the army uniform had.

"I think it really is time for us to say good-bye." He says, his gravely voice going down an octave or two with the conclusion of their situation.

"I unfortunately agree." She says as yet another nurse comes through the door destroying any illusion they had of privacy.

He takes a step back and another stepping up into the corridor.

"Good-bye, Sybil." He manages to get out while walking backwards one, two steps more back, refusing to break their gaze.

"Good-bye, Tom." He turns after that and walks almost to the end of the corridor.

Something comes over her and she has the overwhelming urge to stop him. She shouts his name, and he turns on the spot. She dashes forward leaving her bags in the yard. She meets him where he's turned, his eyes widely looking on her, as she breathes out "write to me." Then gently leaning up she kisses him on the cheek, she'd have kissed him full on the mouth but the group of men doing their exercises in the other yard could see them quite clearly.

"I will," he says, stepping down into the yard, "You have my word." Then he turns and walks away, squaring his shoulders as he walks, she can tell it's taking everything he has to keep walking forward and not rushing back to her. She watches his figure get smaller and smaller and then he rounds a corner and he's gone.

She goes back to her bags and lifts them up with some effort, this is what she signed up for, independence and she'll not complain once. She walks forward and waits for yet another nurse to walk out of the door that had been the opening for so many disruptions. She enters it and finds a well kept looking woman with light brown hair sitting at a desk going over some papers.

"Hello, I'm Sybil Crawley, I'm checking in for my slot in the nursing course."

The woman nods curtly, and looks over what appears to be a list of names.

"Ah, yes, Crawley, Sybil, here you are. Please come with me?"

And that's how her first day away from Downton reached the halfway point.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two

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><p>I arrive at the hospital again at about half past twelve, the main room is a flood of chaos just like a month before. Another lot of freshly wounded soldiers from the front are slowly being sorted. I hear their muffled and sometimes sharp cries of pain, the smell of wet bandages, and the sharp scent of too many men in one room all in need of a good bath. The ones with focused eyes look out at me pleadingly, judgmentally, accusingly. I feel like a fool standing about holding a basket in one hand, my chauffeurs cap tucked under my arm. I deserve their stares, I'm not broken like they are, but I could well have been in another life.<p>

I search her out finding her up to her neck with helping some poor lad no older than 17, his bandaged arms and legs a pristine white. I watch her neatly tuck a final bandage into place then quietly telling the boy to lie still and try and get some rest, "the doctor will be around to check on you as soon as he can." Then she makes the move to start in on helping another hapless man.

I put aside any insecurity I'm feeling and speak from behind her.

"Milady, I've brought you your lunch."

She startles at my voice, she was so engrossed in her tasks and the clamour of the room. I see her place her hand over her heart, like she's trying to calm its beating.

"Branson?" She turns and looks at me "you gave me a start, but I just don't have time for that right now, leave it at the nurses station like before, please."

I shake my head, watching her attack another task, gently scolding a man whose head dressing has started to unravel as he's obviously kept fiddling with it. I stand dumbly by holding the damn basket.

"I'm sorry, but I've been given strict instructions that I bring the basket back by half past one, empty."

She stands up straight looking at me exasperated.

"That's ridiculous."

"There are a lot of things that are ridiculous, but not as ridiculous as I am standing here holding a basket, begging you to take care of yourself."

She was scowling before, now her face breaks into an incredulous smile. Then she seems to give in.

"All right, meet me in the garden in ten minutes."

"Very well, but if I don't see you in that time though, I'm coming back to find you."

She tries to suppress that her smile is growing bigger by forcing an exaggerated frown on her face.

Ten minutes later she comes around the corner of the entrance to the garden, I'm sitting on a low brick wall, a raised bed filled with what will eventually be flowers again, everything is still green though, everything stays green here. I immediately rise to standing, I can't stay seated in her presence if we're not in a car, or if I'm not invited, not in public anyway, and there are at least two soldiers and a nurse milling about the garden as well as her and I.

"I can't believe they're making you watch me eat, it just seems superfluous. I'm sure you have better things to do than this." She says this walking to me, then sitting down on the edge of the raised bed.

"I don't think it's superfluous at all." The garden has emptied out as I finish the last word. "Besides, I'd rather ensure that you don't run yourself into the ground like before."

She eyes me, then looks down looking slightly embarrassed.

"Really, that was nothing"

I'm referring to less than a week before being tasked to pick her up after her evening shift, and having to stop at the side of the road and strongly encourage her to drink from the never opened canister of water in the same basket sitting on the wall now. She'd dehydrated her self to the point where she nearly passed out. When we finally made it back to the house, she'd walked in looking so worse for wear, that sometime later her mother came downstairs and interrupted a few of us sitting about the dining room having a cup of tea. I was reading one of my papers of course. But, she came in and we all had to scramble up from our chairs, she told us to stay as we were and not to get up, but that if she could speak to Mrs. Patmore and to me? We both said yes of course, and I knew it had to do with Sybil. In my head she's still Sybil - even though after that day in York I've never called her that once to her face, only in writing.

We'd exchanged maybe a dozen or more letters in the time she was away at her course. I tried to keep things light as did she, we wrote about our daily lives, but sometimes the heaviness of our real lives would creep onto the pages, sometimes the words in ink just didn't feel like enough. And then her course was over, and I did pick her up, and I did drive her home, but the words stayed in the courtyard and on those pages.

I feel it's coming undone though sometimes, like I'll unravel like one of her tightly wrapped bandages and I'll say it all again, the words will weep out of me- I can sense my resolve withering away with the months.

Coming back to the moment at hand, I reach into the basket and hand her a sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. "It may be nothing, but it could have been something." She scoffs then takes the neatly wrapped packet, unfolds the paper and starts eating the hardy sandwich with delicate bites.

"Don't hold back on account of me. I've seen dogs fighting over scraps in the street, and my own brothers downing fish and chips like they'd never see a chip again in their lives."

She stops mid bite and looks at me with her wide blue eyes. She cocks an eye brow and takes a surprisingly large bite of her sandwich, her cheeks full up, then she starts chewing. Her mouth closed, but you can tell she's struggling a little bit.

"Bit off more than you can chew, literally - eh?" She rolls her eyes, and takes the canister of water I hand to her gratefully. Washing down the mouthful of food.

"Don't challenge me, I'm likely to take you on - and then choke to death on it." As the words leave her mouth, she realises their double meaning and has to look away.

"I'm, I'm sorry, I didn't mean..."

"It's all right - I can read the subtleties. I'll wait at the car, you can bring the basket out when you're finished." I'm not thinking as I do all this, just reacting. I always do this, this is what my mum always called me being hot headed. But I can't help it in this moment - her words hurt.

I turn to leave as she still attempts to apologise for her misspoken words. "Branson, **_genuinely_**... I didn't mean anything doubly, nothing hidden, I promise."

I've fixed my hat back on my head and look her square in the face. "Nothing hidden, but plenty said, milady."

I make my way towards the entrance of the garden, I feel her eyes on me, and then I hear the rustle of her skirts, and her hand on my arm. I pull my arm out from her grasp and turn to look at her, her eyes pleading, her mouth open.

"I didn't mean them." She says forcefully. "You challenge me, you always have - that's one of the best things about you. And I never want you to stop being that, or doing that for me, never." I cross my arms over my chest, I still feel raw.

I give up and drop them, weighing my words before I say anything. "It's the same for me," I look her square in the eyes emphasising my meaning, "you're exactly the same for me."

"It's settled then." She turns to walk back to the wall where she left the basket and the barely eaten sandwich. She sits back down and stares at me - waiting. "Are you going to join me or not, eating alone is bad for digestion - you don't want to make me ill, do you?"

"No, never..." I settle down next to her and take off my hat, I've been invited - it's allowed.

"You wouldn't happen to like pudding, would you?" She smiles at me and picking her sandwich back up and taking a more reasonable bite.

"I don't know any body who doesn't like pudding." I tell her, I can hear the lilt of suppressed laughter in my own voice.

"Good, because Mrs Patmore always gives me too much when she makes it, we can share." She continues to eat her sandwich, chewing thoughtfully and swallowing diligently.

"But there's only one spoon." I tell her.

She finishes swallowing, and shakes her head "I don't mind sharing, if you don't?" She picks up an apple that's nestled next to the custard container that holds the pudding, and takes a bite, it crunches loudly in the empty garden, and she smiles around the mouthful of fruit.

"I don't mind." I say.

She nods and hands me the custard container, and the lone spoon Mrs Patmore had one of the kitchen maids pack. She indicates with her head that I can start, but she doesn't speak around a new portion of apple.

I tuck into the pudding, chocolate pudding at that - and take the first bite. I feel her watching me more than see it, because I close my eyes around the flavour of the chocolate. Mrs Patmore doesn't tend to make rich deserts for the staff, we get biscuits occasionally - maybe some nice preserves, a cake every now and again, but rarely chocolate.

"How is it?" She asks.

"Honestly? It's divine."

She lets out a tiny laugh. "I never thought I'd ever hear you use that word to describe something as benign as food."

I quirk my eye brow at her. "Food is not benign, food is essential. That's why when there's a shortage or the threat of one, people react - they revolt, or they emigrate en masse to save them selves. Like the French, they revolted and over through the monarchy - why, essentially because the bare bones of it was food or the lack of it. Food is not benign, it's the life blood of a nation."

She continues to chew her apple, then in a very un-lady like manner says "I know, that's why I said it - I wanted to hear you pontificate." All whilst still chewing on her apple.

"You mean _rant_." She then surprises me once again and lets out and even less lady like snort.

"Yes, exactly... your rant. I love your rants."

I look her in the eyes, taking in that she just used the word love in context with something about myself.

"And I love ranting to you..." I should add milady to the sentence, but I don't - I don't think I ever can say it to her again. She's not a lady to me anymore - she's something different and better. I can only hope she'll reciprocate and call me Tom again. I miss her smokey tones saying it, I think I miss it everyday.

By ten past she's finished, and the garden is peopled by patients and nurses again. When a nurse came around into the garden wheeling a man with bandages wrapped around his eyes, I looked over at Sybil and she nodded. Our equal footing would have to be put aside in front of others, so I stood and dawned my cap again, clasping my hands behind my back, and waited politely for her to finish her lunch. I watched her, trying to not seem transfixed when she took up the spoon I'd used only minutes before and finished off the pudding. She closed her eyes just like I did as she tasted it the first time, but then she hummed. Her pink tongue edged out of her mouth and licked her lips as she swallowed, and I had to look away, if she saw my eyes in that moment - she'd know my thoughts had ventured very far off course, so off course that that spoon was no longer a spoon. I steeled my self once she was finished, and handed me the basket.

"You'll be back tomorrow I gather?"

"Yes," Then stepped up a closer to her, looking about to see if anyone was noticing us or could hear us, "but only if you'll have me."

She says nothing, only smiles the smallest of smiles and nods.

I nod in response, look about again and say it. "Good-bye, Sybil."

I don't wait to hear her say my name back, I just turn and walk out of the garden. I can feel her eyes on me as I walk away, and I know she's smiling as she's does it.


End file.
